reloading

[Danny1]

ive just put in for the 222 cf. had hmr for 3 years now.. i dont shoot that many bullets, so would reloading be advisable? thaught more of it being interesting than cost effective? and what would be a decent starter kit?

[Turnup]

You would need to shoot a lot of ammo to make reloading economic in a reasonable timescale, but there are other reasons for reloading:

1) As you say it is interesting and many happy hours can be had fiddling around with dies, powders, bullets, primers, crimps case length/headspace etc.

2) Many guns perform much better when using a home load which suits them rather than factory ammunition, but you might have to put in quite a bit of time to find the load which works best in your gun.


I reload for both of the above reasons

[tacfoley]

I guess that choosing a decreasingly popular and harder to find calibre like .222 might be a good reason to reload, but as Turnup notes, you'd need to do a lot of shooting before getting any realistic return on your outlay of at least £300 or more, and that's mostly second-hand. Reloading is not a cheap option - it just lets you do more shooting than you would with factory stuff - swings and roundabout kind of thing.

By the time you've bought, say, forty rounds of factory ammunition and shot it to get the cases - what many people do - bought the bullets, and a to-go propellant, plus primers - all of which, apart from the cases, disappears in a bang forever, AND the reloading gear, it will be around £450 or more BEFORE you can begin to reload. That's a lot of factory ammunition... Even the average reloading manual these days costs around £25.

[dodgyrog]

I guess that choosing a decreasingly popular and harder to find calibre like .222 might be a good reason to reload, but as Turnup notes, you'd need to do a lot of shooting before getting any realistic return on your outlay of at least £300 or more, and that's mostly second-hand. Reloading is not a cheap option - it just lets you do more shooting than you would with factory stuff - swings and roundabout kind of thing.

By the time you've bought, say, forty rounds of factory ammunition and shot it to get the cases - what many people do - bought the bullets, and a to-go propellant, plus primers - all of which, apart from the cases, disappears in a bang forever, AND the reloading gear, it will be around £450 or more BEFORE you can begin to reload. That's a lot of factory ammunition... Even the average reloading manual these days costs around £25.

I have to say that I think that price is rather high.
Bullets, primers and powder is not cheap but there are ways to reduce the cost e.use cast bullets.
Brass can be acquired once fired at a reasonable price or even free.
Press and dies secondhand are to be found at reasonable, even cheap, prices.
The real reason for reloading I find is that it is a hobby in itself.

[DesG]

I've had a 222 for a few years as I always fancied one after reading an article in the seventies in the old Guns and Ammo magazine. It is the father of the .223 (5.56) and for many years was the benchrest calibre of choice due to its inherent accuracy until the 6mm class took over. Although the 223 is very popular due to the ready availabilty of mil surplus ammo and cases, the 222 still has a large following and factory ammo is easily available in virtually any gunshop for as low as £15 or so for twenty. If all you want to do is pop off the occasional fox then that is all you need.

I have always reloaded so I went straight into reloading for the 222. I picked up a few hundred empties at auction (Welsh arms auction) for next to nothing. Small rifle primers can be had for thirty quid a thousand at places like the gunshow. Suitable powder is around forty quid a pound which with 20gn loads will give you 350 shots at about 11p each. I managed to pick up what was sold as "about 1000 assorted .224 bullet heads" which ended up being 1300 good quality (Sierra, berger, Hornady etc) bullets still in sealed boxes and varying in weight from 40gn to 72gn for £52 at one auction and then another 1400 Sierra 55gn at the next auction for about fifty quid again. Very cheap shooting for years to come.

I have a couple of very old single stage Wamadet loading presses which I use for everything except my .38 loading (Progressive press for that). A second hand press can be had very cheaply if you look around. Even new they are not overly expensive. Die sets from about £40.

The 222 is very easy to load for and very forgiving. I've put a few hundred down range with different loads, bullet weights and types and mixed cases and they have all shot within an inch or so at 200 yds with no great difficulty. As has been said earlier, reloading can be fun and it is very satisfying to put in an excellent group with your own load. Most 222 rifles have a slow twist of 1 in 14 or so, so anything heavier than 55gn start to become unstable. I tried some of the 72gn projectiles and they keyholed beautifully at 100yds, although they work great in my mate's 223 (1 in 8). Little 40gn hollow points can be driven at over 3000fps and are deadly on foxes at three hundred yards.

[tacfoley]

I have to say that I think that price is rather high.
Bullets, primers and powder is not cheap but there are ways to reduce the cost e.use cast bullets.
Brass can be acquired once fired at a reasonable price or even free.
Press and dies secondhand are to be found at reasonable, even cheap, prices.
The real reason for reloading I find is that it is a hobby in itself.

Good luck finding another shooter with a .222 - I know of only one other, and there are over 400 people in our little club. We all agree that reloading is a hobby all on its own, notwithstanding the fact that you are going to be shooting the end result in order to do more...and shooting cast bullets in a .222, IMO, defeats the object of having a high-stepping .22 centre fire in the fust place.

[sirmissalot]

I'm stuck in the .222/.223 dilemma. Variation for a .222 and see what can be done with modern powders and components or a .223 which is a more or less given as far as accuracy goes out to >250, which is all I need. Hmmmmm.......

I do like the "heritage" of the .222 though.